All the Right Reasons
by Melain
Summary: One mistake, and he was sealed back inside the ring. But this time... Bakura's breaking down, admitting defeat. He's willing to change if he could get another chance, but is anyone going to even help him? Who says he even gets another chance? Shonenai


This story's a little odd. It's a song-fic for '_Savin' me_' by Nickleback, but it will be multiple chapters.

This first chapter is just about Bakura, and I decided to describe his soul room. To me a soul room is a place more than a room. Like Yugi's is a small brick room filled with childhood toys; to me that means that he still has an innocence of a child, and the small room represents that he's never had many options and is basically confided to only a number of places and is smothered by his grandfather (which I resulted from the low ceiling). Yami's is easy enough to understand, but it proved my theory that a soul room can be a place more than a room.

Bakura is really out of character in this chapter, and will most likely be throughout the story. Because I'm making him realize he needs to change, if he wants to continue living in a world like ours. I don't think I did a good job in making you realize that he was still the Bakura we all know and love, but mistakes happen and one cost him the chance to live in this world. In most stories that he is still a complete asshole as we love him, he doesn't still go around stealing every night and murdering people. In this story he does, and he's not really thinking straight. He had the choice of being himself but not being a criminal, and he didn't take it. So now he's thinking he needs to change himself in order to get his life back… if he can get his life back.

This is going to be shonen-ai, I'm not sure what pairing yet though. Either Tendershipping, Theifshipping, or Psychoshipping. Or a combination. I'll come up with one when I get there I guess, this will just be a warning to all who even decide to read this.

I hope you like it.

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**Disclaimers:** Melain doesn't own Yugioh or any of it's characters, and also doesn't own the song _Savin' Me_ by Nickleback.

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**A L L . T H E . R I G H T . R E A S O N S**

_Chapter 1_

_-Prison gates won't open up for me-_

Gravel, dust, and sand crunched underneath black combat boots as they slowly paced along the cement walkway. Jagged mountains of rock and other indestructible materials caused it to weave back and forth in the shadows, which consumed everything in sight. The sky was also black with what seemed to be streaks of blood streamed across it like some twisted version of clouds. No stars or moon shone in this sky, the only light being that of a soft glow emitting from the figure's chest. The path wound through the darkness for miles, never ending as it had no true beginning.

The wasteland had developed after the spirit's encounter with the new age it had finally emerged in. Changing the once sand pathway into that of concrete and dimming the river of souls that flowed underneath it. The only comfort in that was the wails of the 99 souls had become almost inaudible, leaving the spirit to dwell in the deafening silence. Kicking at the gravel, dark-chocolate eyes glared at the cursed pathway; wishing it would end.

As he willed it, he looked up to see a part of the path turn off into a rock cliff and a soft red glow appearing in room laid into the cliff. The light might have been soft at first glance, but it still held a harsh presence. Shoving his hands into his trench coat pockets the spirit started over towards the only place that wasn't consumed in shadows. As he crossed the cement pathway that hung over the river, the spirit barely glanced at the souls reaching out for his boot-clad feet. Knowing that no matter how hard they tried, they couldn't drag him down with them; they couldn't touch him.

He entered the chamber, which glowed a blood red thanks to a torch on the wall that held an oddly colored flame, purple and the same blood red that it washed the room with. Silk pillows and golden trimmed blankets adorned one corner, making the makeshift bed soft but still stiff and rough from the stone flooring. A cracked mirror stone laid into one wall, next to an assortment of daggers and other weapons. And on the wall opposite and next to the discolored torch was a door. Stalking up to the mirror, a distorted reflection gazed back at him. His form reflected off the shining stone; dull and tired dark brown eyes under a mess of white bangs, wild white locks of hair cascaded over his shoulders and down his back, and a thin yet somewhat weary scowl set on his thin, pale face. To the right of his reflection was a smirking tan figure with shoulder-length white hair, hard blue eyes, and arms crossed with a stance of superiority. One which the spirit had once possessed but had lost to the shadows and numerous days in this dwelling. Brown eyes cast a forlorn glance to the left of his reflection where another figure once smiled back at him. Re-crossing his arms, the tan figure's smirk grew as he shook his head; giving the spirit a taunting look. Mouthing words to him, 'He's never coming back.'

Glaring at the figure, the spirit left the mirror before collapsing onto the pillows in the corner. Sighing, his gaze fell onto the door across the room. It was made of iron, with a number of chains and locks strewn across it; a small barred window near the top that was currently blocked on the other side. Blocking his view from… Tearing his eyes away from the door, he crossed his arms behind his head and scowled at the ceiling; not wishing to look at the chambers or the world outside them.

And silently cursing the irony that was the basis of a soul room.

Locked up again for… who knows how long. The shadows had evolved somehow, making time impossible to determine; it could have been 10 weeks since he was sealed, 10 months, 10 years. Time dragged and sped up randomly, just to confuse and spite the tomb robber. Or at least it seemed that way.

Shadows started to crawl along the ceiling, creating shapes and images of his memories. He closed his eyes to block them out, he didn't need reminding; he knew he screwed up. But this time it was bigger than anything he had ever done; and it had cost him his freedom. He had finally found a form of peace in this new world, and it had been ripped from him all because of one mistake. One small mistake that caused his demise.

The necklace use to be his anyway; he didn't know some whacked-priest had put a curse on it. But it had made a much bigger deal than Bakura had thought it would. A giant rip in the shadow realm that fused that world with the present. It was a very very big deal, and he had been to blame. The pharaoh and that stupid tomb keeper Shadi had been so mad that they locked him back in the ring, and then took the ring from his hikari… so he couldn't get back out until the next holder came along. Which would only take about three more millennia at the least.

The only reason the pharaoh had even let him wander was that he had promised he wouldn't cause any trouble (with his fingers crossed behind his back). His hikari had warned him so many times to be careful with what he did, and to try and not cause any chaos. But of course he didn't listen. Why would he? He stole, gambled, fought, and occasionally murdered anyway. It's what he enjoyed, and who he was. No one was going to change that; he was pretty much too stubborn to let them. Eventually his hikari had stopped telling him that he should keep his promise; Bakura expected him to basically ignore him. But he didn't; he'd still smile at him when the spirit came home once in a while, washed the blood out of his clothes, and to his surprise… still told him to be careful whenever he was about to leave the house. He left a lot, never even home during the evening or most of the night. But he only left because he felt like his hikari was starting to have some effects on him; whenever Bakura came home soaked in blood his hikari would just give him this saddened, disappointed look that tore the spirit apart from the inside out. This strange feeling of letting someone down surged through him; it was foreign to him, and he wasn't sure how to deal with it. So he would leave every night, and the feeling would soon vanish.

But this mistake, it all started when he had gone to get Malik from the museum… and had seen his necklace. Actually it had been his mother's necklace. A gleaming amethyst stone laid into a golden ring, on a foreign silver chain. The stone could spin in the golden ring, and when he had been just a child he would amuse himself by spinning it. At the museum he had seen it in the back with some other artifacts that needed to go on display. Just as casually as possible, he had passed the table in the back and slid the necklace into his pocket. Just like that, almost too easy; but he got out the door and that was all that mattered. Later, his hikari was thrilled to find that he wasn't going to leave him that night. About midnight though, the tomb robber had gone out on the roof and took the necklace out. Just as he had done when he was younger, he started to spin the amethyst stone… and that was the small mistake he had made. It triggered the curse; no less than 10 hours later he had been sealed into the ring, and endured the searing pain of his bond being torn from him and his hikari.

All his fault, he just couldn't help himself. He was a thief after all, who would ever expect him to change. The pharaoh didn't, and of course he was right once again. And his hikari had to pay for it.

His eyes started to sting; no, why would he cry? He wasn't even that fond of the new world he had emerged in… but he had been quite fond of the people he had found there. Of the life he had found there.

But had already broke down. It was a denial that had lasted him about six years when he had first been sealed into the ring. Constant denying ever even wanting to exist in the world he had been born into, telling himself that now he was immortal and he didn't have to worry about that life and just wait to emerge in a better one, and then breaking down in tears of sorrow… missing everyone he knew that had ever remotely cared for him, and giving himself false hope that someone would release him and he could live the life he had been living before. He screamed to the gods; cursed them, begged them to set him free, begged for forgiveness for all the wicked things he had done, and then cursing them again for not only his fate but for ignoring him. He had only just gone through that again, and had the strange feeling it was still going on.

He still wanted to go home.

_-On these hands and knees I'm crawling-_

He still missed his friends. Yes, he finally had friends that… despite how he was about to put… he knew he could always count on. Oh Yugi-tachi would have a field day if they heard him admit that. But it was true, he could always turn to Malik and his crazy-ass-yami; even his bitch of a sister who didn't even like him anyway had gotten him out of a lot of messes lately. Blinking his eyes open he wondered if she had known this was going to happen to him…

"Bitch," he muttered.

The shadows were still playing charades with his memories; so he shut his eyes again as they formed, for some odd reason, his hikari's school. Sometimes Bakura would take over just to talk to Malik, but that was it. And the occasional prank; TPing the locker rooms, ex cetra. They had had a lot of good times there though; it was there that the tomb robber had grown a slight admiration and acquaintanceship with the stuck-up Seto Kaiba. That didn't stop him from robbing his house whenever he got bored though. Those paintings sold for a lot of yen.

He didn't miss the robbing so much, or the gambling; he had even admitted he would give it up for good, no strings attached, if he could just escape. A tomb robber always keeps his word if he makes it truthfully (no fingers crossed). He'd give anything just to have even said good-bye to those freaks; he didn't see them even, just a one-way zap-magic-thing into the ring. The only person he saw that he cared about was his hikari, it was a split second before he had disappeared… he had looked so scared when he got in the room. Actually Bakura didn't even know if he got into the room, all he saw was him at the door and then he was thrown into the shadows.

Wetness clung to his eyelashes and threatened to spill down his face. He had let him down again; he could never do anything right. Silently he began cursing the gods, forgetting for a second that even if there was a god that wanted to help him they couldn't hear him through the ring's magic barrier. But it still gave him something to let his anger out on. It was that or running.

Even in Egypt he would just run through the desert to let all his anger out, it was a lot healthier than killing someone; which was what he had to do in the small confidents of a big city like Domino. It was also the only time that he had been thankful for the irony of his soul room; the endless road that represented his endless life that would always get him nowhere since he had always followed the same path, forever haunted by the river of the 99 villager's souls. It was a perfect running streak. He would run for hours till he collapsed, and started to crawl on his hands and knees desperately wanting the road to lead somewhere so he could feel like he accomplished something… that just once in his life he did something right. But the road never leads anywhere; it never ends. He would crawl till he collapsed in near exhaustion and pass out, and when he would wake up… he'd be right where he was before. No one was there to take him someplace safe, the horrible reality of his soul room haunted him just as much as the metaphors and irony it held… and the river of souls.

He could never get anywhere, no matter how hard he tried or how far he went. There was nothing waiting for him, and his soul room mirrored that fact. At one point, about a few months ago, there was a city in the distance. He had tried so hard to get there, and he wasn't even sure what he did in the real world that would give him something that he might be able to accomplish. But he never got there; just another thing he'd never get. Taunting him once again.

A tear finally slipped down his face, and he hurriedly wiped it away. He had also cried enough. He had ran for hours, collapsed, and crawled for a few more just as he had done before. But while crawling… he had been a mess; in tears, screaming for someone to hear him, to come and set him free. Sending threats and pleas and obscenities into the darkness, only to hear them bounce off of the random rock formations and echo right back at him. Tears falling down his face and sobs escaping from his throat; if any god could forgive him and get him out of there… they probably would at the sight of him out of sympathy.

He knew that only three people could actually get him out of the ring; the pharaoh who if he showed up Bakura would probably murder or, if he was collapsed from running, spit at him. Shadi was another, and the tomb robber couldn't do anything to him; technically the tomb keeper didn't even exist. And then there was his hikari, who no longer had the ring. Bakura was somewhat thankful that the small barred window on the iron door was blocked, that way he wouldn't see the now empty hallway; there was once another door, but the tomb robber was almost sure that it was no longer there.

As much as that kid had bothered him, he missed his hikari immensely. Maybe it was the bond they had once shared that was now ripped in half that made him miss him so much, as the pain of that shredded bond ached and throbbed nearly all the time. The only time it didn't was when he was at a flat out run on the hovering pathway. Or maybe it was because his hikari was one of the only people in his five thousand and something years of existence that actually showed he cared about the tomb robber's well being. Though technically nothing could harm the spirit, he still worried about him. And in return an unwanted feeling of worry for the white-haired teen became apparent in the spirit. He was always over-protective of his hikari; and whenever either of them happened to be dragged somewhere foreign to them, they stuck close to their other half. It was most defiantly the bond the ring had formed between them, but after a while they grew on each other; and even though Bakura would never admit, they cared for each other in a way. Nothing romantic… but still a care. A feeling that made him just wish he could just speak with his under appreciated hikari, feel him smile through their shared link, and have feelings that the spirit was sure he probably couldn't conjure himself also be spread through the link to lighten up the anger and hurt that had been stained into his everyday emotions. Maybe it was true, the saying that light and darkness cannot exist without each other. Also that the bond that the tomb keeper had told them about, created by the items, made each of them whole… and the 'other-half' name true.

How he missed him; it was like a wound that wouldn't heal, but just spread unbearably slow. He missed the house that he wished that his soul room would reflect somehow, but didn't. The house that he had learned so much in; that he had lived a life with friends and… a family. His hikari was possibly the closest thing to family that he had had sense he was seven, and his hikari treated him like family. Just as Isis did; she still made him clean any mess he made in her house, and if he stayed too long made him do chores. But also gave him the odd-mothering that she gave both Malik and Marik.

But his hikari had always been there for him; Bakura had saved his ass from street thugs a couple times, but he wasn't sure why his hikari always thought he owed him. He gave him a room, made him meals, cleaned the house, barely ever asked him to lift a finger except for the occasional 'could you go to the store' or 'could you help me with some yard work' type-things. His hikari always smiled and always acknowledged him when he came in the same room, let alone walked through the front door. For a while when he was once again locked in the ring, he claimed he missed the attention… but now he could deny that he just missed his other half.

Opening his eyes, he turned his head towards the iron door; the chains glistened in the torchlight, mocking him. Everyday he wished for the chains to rust away into nothing and for the door to just swing open; even if it's just the pharaoh or the tomb keeper to check up on him and make sure he's not scheming. It would give him a glance across the hallway to see if his hikari's door is even there. More tears slipped from his now flooded dark brown eyes, more tears of frustration than anything. Once again tearing his eyes from the door he looked back up at the ceiling where the shadows were starting to portray faces. As if reading his mind, they morphed into his hikari's face; but not the smiling face he wanted. That drained look in his eyes, of hopelessness; that he could never get Bakura to change and that whatever he said was ignored by the tomb robber. The look he got when he walked in and dropped a dagger on the kitchen table dripping in blood, or come home smelling like smoke and alcohol.

Another pain struck his chest seeing that look, the only images he had seen of his hikari in the past… however long he had been in the ring… were only in his mind's eye. Those eyes bore into his; they were black, not the chocolate brown that he remembered. Pools of black that made him think he was drowning, his throat constricting and breathing becoming shallow. Blinking he tried to look away before he realized his right hand had reached out towards the image, as if trying to touch it. The image melted and the shadow, a lighter shade than any of the others, drifted down to his hand and slid around his wrist. It slithered down his arm and curled up under his neck, nuzzling him. His bond with the shadows had never died, and in his soul room they were one of the few forms of comfort; even though some had evil intentions and others were more of an annoyance than anything. There were a few old ones that seemed to adore him.

He relaxed more into the pillows, and his gaze once again fell on the iron door. His face felt tight from the dry tear trails, and his eyes stung as he had no more tears to cry. His right hand had dropped not to his side, but farther out and now had another shadow curling around his wrist. His palm up and fingers relaxed out, in the direction of the iron door; as if reaching for it. The swollen feeling in his eyes made blinking hurt; he was sure they were red by now, but more tears blinded him as they suddenly appeared. Blurring his vision of the door, he felt sleep weighing heavily on his mind. He closed his eyes once again, only the ice-cold sensation of the shadows crawling over him and the throbbing pain in his head and chest numbing him into an oddly-comforting slumber. Feeling broken, and only one thought on his mind.

Another tear slipped from his closed eyes before one word uttered from his lips.

"Ryou."

Another pain shot through his chest at the name; and more faces and names flooded back into his mind. And it settled on the image of those drowning black eyes; a scowl slid across his face and his eyes narrowed. A thought crossing his mind as he slipped into unconsciousness.

'His eyes are brown.'

_-Oh, I reach for you-_

**TBC

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I hope everyone understood what I was getting at in this chapter. I was trying to describe Bakura's suffering in the ring, it is really hard. To realize that you will never get your life back; and being sealed _back _into the ring to endure the pain again after he had found a life he was happy with. It hurts. Most people who write this kind of stuff just think Bakura will sit there until he's set free. No. It's _Bakura_! Hello? He's not just going to sit and wait, he wants out. He's a free spirit; yes, he's immortal but that doesn't mean he just wants to do nothing.

So I pointed that out. That situation can tear anyone apart, and it did just that to him. He's broken down, defeated and he admits that. 5000 years of living will make you think, he hasn't gotten anywhere. Will he get somewhere by the end of this story :shrugs: Who knows…

Please review, it motivates me to update… or stop the story, depends on the review. Tell me does it suck as much as I think it does? This is a complete chaos theory here, I'm not sure if anyone's tried a plot like this before (and there might be a reason for that).

:skims chapter: Wow, I talk a lot. Sry.

Please review!

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_- Melain_


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